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Filling & Sealing Equipment
Xcelodose® System News
Press Releases
2003
Meridica extends its Xcelodose® Showcasing Agreement with Quintiles - 12 December 2003
Meridica Limited, the Cambridge, UK-based drug delivery company, today announced the renewal of its Showcasing Agreement for Xcelodose®, its unique powder micro-dosing technology, with Quintiles, the world's leading pharmaceutical services organisation.
The Showcasing Agreement, which has already been in place for over a year, makes an Xcelodose® system available to Quintiles' customers in Quintiles' GMP facilities at Edinburgh, UK, as well as providing the framework for co-promotion of the Xcelodose® technology to the pharmaceutical industry.
Quintiles currently features Xcelodose® as a unique technology, which has enabled the company to offer its customers micro-dosing of pharmaceutical drug powder for use in oral dose and inhaled dose clinical supplies The Xcelodose® technology has a number of substantial business benefits, including potentially shortening the drug development process, by reducing the need for costly stability studies, and the avoidance of laborious hand-filling of capsules.
Dr Phil Woodhead, Quintiles' VP Pharmaceutical Sciences Europe, said, "The successful Showcasing Agreement with Meridica has enabled us to offer the innovative Xcelodose® technology to the marketplace. This has clearly fulfilled an unmet market need as, since its installation in May 2002, it has been in constant demand by pharmaceutical companies. We are pleased to extend this Agreement with Meridica and our investment in the Xcelodose® system serves to reinforce Quintiles' commitment to providing innovative technologies to its clients."
David Edwards, Meridica's Director of Strategic Marketing, said, "As the world's largest pharmaceutical services organisation, Quintiles provides a major endorsement of the value of our Xcelodose® technology to the pharmaceutical industry. We are delighted to continue our relationship, which we believe has been mutually beneficial. We believe the relationship has worked extremely well at all levels between Meridica and Quintiles and look forward to continuing success in developing this market."
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Xcelodose®, Meridica's precision automated powder filling technology, has now been licensed to 5 out of the top 10 global pharmaceutical companies - 12 March 2003
Meridica Limited, the drug delivery technology company set up just over eighteen months ago, has received a major endorsement of one of its products by the pharmaceutical industry. It announced today that it has licensed its new precision automated powder filling system, Xcelodose®, to 5 out of the top 10 global pharmaceutical companies for use in the early stage clinical development of their proprietary drug compounds.
Xcelodose® represents the state-of-the-art in precision dispensing of very small amounts of drug powder alone, and has the ability to weigh into capsules and other small containers, amounts from as low as 100 micrograms up to 100 milligrams and beyond with an unprecedented level of accuracy. This is of major interest to pharmaceutical development and clinical trials supplies departments because use of the Xcelodose® technology can eliminate the need for drug dilution with excipients, and the associated formulation and stability work required before commencing early clinical studies. The removal of this potentially lengthy drug dilution step can reduce the drug development time by as much as six months - a significant time and resource saving and increased speed to market.
The automated Xcelodose® technology is unique because until now it has not been possible to dispense such small amounts of drug at speed and with this degree of accuracy.This has two major implications for pharmaceutical companies; firstly, it means that the number of candidate New Chemical Entities (NCEs) that can be screened for safety and efficacy can be significantly increased, and those not meeting the success criteria can be rejected more quickly. Secondly, this then enables companies to focus their limited resources on the most promising candidates.
Dr Ian J Smith, Chief Executive Officer of Meridica Ltd., commented, "We are delighted that major pharmaceutical companies worldwide have recognised the potential of the Xcelodose® technology to reduce drug development timescales and increase their drug development throughput. These companies are renowned for their ability to deliver breakthrough medicines and for their continued focus on new and innovative technologies. We therefore view their investment in the Xcelodose® technology as a major endorsement of Meridica's ability to provide high-value technology solutions to the pharmaceutical industry".
Editor's Notes:
1. Meridica's vision is to become a leading source of creative drug delivery systems and drug products for the pharmaceutical industry, based on the excellence and quality of its products. Meridica's technologies will enable the full exploitation of the "biotechnological" advances made in the last decade, and build a position as a leading industry provider of cutting-edge solutions to drug delivery systems. Meridica is a PA Group company.
2. PA Consulting Group is a leading management, systems and technology consulting firm, with a unique combination of these capabilities. Established almost 60 years ago, and operating worldwide from over 40 offices in around 20 countries, PA draws on the knowledge and experience of some 3,300 people, whose skills span the initial generation of ideas and insights all the way through to detailed implementation.
For more information, visit the web site at www.paconsulting.com
Quintiles, the worlds largest Clinical Research Organisation, is showcasing Xcelodose 600 technology at its GMP clinical manufacturing facility in Edinburgh, UK.
Visitors to Quintiles can view Xceledose handling drug powder at micro-weight level under GMP conditions demonstrating its potential to reduce the overall drug product development timescale.
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